Center support carton



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N. F. KRUEGER ETAL CENTER SUPPORT CARTON Filed Jan.

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April 28, 1964 United States Patent "O 3,13%,892 CENTER SUPPORT CARTONNorman F. Krueger and George A. Spillson, Monroe, Mich assignors toConsolidated Paper Co., Monroe, Mich, a corporation of Michigan FiledJan. 17, 1962, Ser. No. 166,754 1 Claim. (Cl. 229-16) This inventionrelates to folded blank boxes or cartons for packaging bulk materialsand is particularly directed to improved cartons for such use that canbe made from a single blank of light weight paper board.

An object of the present invention is to provide a carton of the typehaving opposed broad panels and opposed narrow panels with means tosupport the broad panels to prevent bulging thereof when the cartoncontains dense bulk material and help the carton maintain its shape aswell as increase the crush factor of the carton without increasing thethickness or weight of the sheet material making up the carton.

Another object of the invention is to provide a carton with a strap orstrut means which bridges the space between opposite side panels tomaintain such panels substantially in parallelism, particularly whenfilled with heavy granular or other like material, such means beingintegral with one such panel portion and securely attached to theopposed panel.

Another object of the invention is to provide a carton with strut meanswhich requires a minimum of additional material and of simpleconstruction so that it can be economically produced by standard cartonmanufacturing equipment.

Generally speaking the carton of .the present invention is ofrectangular form and comprises four side panels, two of which are widepanels and two are narrow panels, and end closures provided by flapswhich are extensions of the side panels. One of the wide panels isformed of two sections, one at each end of the blank from which thecarton is made, which are overlapped to provide a central longitudinalseam, and integral with one of these sections is a comparatively narrowextension or strut capable of extending between the two wide sidepanels. The strut is provided with a flange which is glued to the widepanel to which the strut extends, the strut being located to one side ofthe longitudinal center line of the blank horizontal center line of thecarton to position the strut in the lower half of the formed box toprevent the wide panels from bulging from static pressure of the bulk orgranular material in the carton, whether filled or partially filledtherewith. This construction also permits a saving of the sheet fromwhich the carton blank is cut, by fitting the two struts side by sidewith their outer ends abutting the edges of the overlapped portions ofthe other carton blank.

The above mentioned and other features and objects of this invention andthe manner of attaining them will become more apparent and the inventionitself will be best understood by reference to the following descriptionof an embodiment of the invention taken in conjunction with theaccompanying drawing, wherein:

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a carton incorporating the presentinvention in fully assembled condition, with a part broken away and thecenter support being shown in dotted lines;

FIG. 2 is an enlarged rear elevation of the carton shown 3,130,892Patented Apr. 28, 1964 in FIG. 1, with an upper part broken away and thecenter support being shown in dotted lines in a position below thehorizontal center line of the carton;

FIG. 3 is a sectional view taken on a line III-III of FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 is a sectional view taken on aline IVIV of FIG. 2 showing thecarton filled with a bulk material;

FIG. 5 is an end view of a glued up carton in collapsed position forshipping or storage; and

FIG. 6 is a developed plan view of the blank from which the carton isassembled,'together with a fragment of another blank to illustrate amethod of producing the struts with a minimum of waste material.

Referring to the drawings, and particularly FIG. 1 thereof, a carton 10incorporating the present invention is shown as of folded blank B, Btype (see FIG. 6) including four rectangular panels or side walls havingtop and bottom end closures provided by hinged flaps or extensions ofthe side walls. Front wall 12 and rear wall 14 are comparatively wide,while side walls 15 and 16, connecting the front and rear walls togetheralong fold or score lines 17 and 18, are relatively narrow. Tofacilitate the production of the present carton from a single blank B,as shown in FIG. 6, one of the Wide walls, preferably rear wall 14, ismade of two panels of sections 14a and 141) at opposite ends of theblank, which overlap to provide a seam at 20 which seam is glued so thatpanel 14a is securely attached to the face of panel 14b.

The narrow sides 15 and 16 have flaps 21 and 22, respectively, asseparate extensions of opposite ends thereof cut at ends of score lines17 and 18 in the blank B, which, when folded inwardly on score lines 24and 25, serve to partially close the top and bottom ends of the carton.The front wall panel 12 is also provided with top and bottom end flaps27 hinged along the lines 24 and 25. Rear wall 14 has top and bottom endflaps 29 which may be the outer closures due to the seam 20 therein, itbeing noted 'with particular reference to FIGS. 1 and 6, that the seam20 extends the full width of the blank including the flaps 29 dividingthem into portions 29a and 29b corresponding with the wide side portions14a and 14b, respectively. Double thickness of material at the seam isnot objectionable due to the use of much lighter paper board than thatrequired for cartons of comparable size which are not provided with thewall supporting means now to be described.

Projecting from the panel 14b end of the blank is a strut 35 hinged topanel 14b at score line 37 so that the strut is to one side of thelongitudinal center C of the blank (see FIG. 6) or below the horizontalcenter line C of the set up carton (see FIG. 2). The strut 35 terminatesin a flange 38 which is coated with adhesive for securing the flange tothe inner face of front wall 12 at spot 40. Thus, in the assembledcarton the strut 35 is located in the lower half thereof with its loweredge spaced from the carton bottom, so that when the carton is filled orpartly filled with bulk material M (see FIG. 4) the walls 12 and 14 areprevented from bulging or bowing outwardly thereby. Due to its narrowwidth, preferably less than one-half the length of panel 14b, and beingspaced from the bottom of the carton, strut 35 readily permits thepassage of material from one section of the carton to another andprevents retention of material when the carton top is opened and thecarton is tipped V to be emptied.

By means of the present inventiommuch lighter paper board may beutilized for cartons of substantial size than would be required toprevent bulging of the front and rear walls without the present centerstrut or support. The blanks may be cut in pairs from the paper boardstock so that the struts 3535 of adjacent blanks B and B are alternatedso as to be produced from the material therebetween to reduce Waste to aminimum. By gluing the seam 20 and the strut flange 38 to the Wall 12,the cartons may be shipped and stored in the flat as shown in H6. 5, itonly being necessary to close and seal the bottom flaps prior to and thetop flaps subsequent to filling the cartons.

While there is described above the principles of this invention inconnection with specific apparatus, it is to be clearly understood thatthis description is made only by Way of example and not as a limitationto the scope of this invention.

We claim:

A folded blank box for bulk material made from a unitary, light weightpaperboard blank cut and scored to provide when folded into boxformation: end and side Walls having inner and outer bottom and topwalls, one

of said side Walls and its associated top and bottom walls being formedfrom two sections, one at each end of said blank, the outer edges ofsaid one side and its associated top and bottom sections beingoverlapped and glued to form a seam, one of said side wall sectionshaving an integral strut strip to one side of the center of saidoverlapped edge and intermediate the top and bottom, said strut striphaving a glued flap at its outer end for attachment to the other andopposite one of said side walls and said strut strip having a width lessthan one half of the length of the side wall from which it extends,whereby said strut strip prevents bulging of said side walls when saidbox contains bulk material, and whereby two of said blanks may be cutfrom a sheet with the ends of said glue flaps of said strut stripsabutting the edges of said adjacent blanks, and the side edges of saidstrips being adjacent each other.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS1,956,458 Watson Apr. 24, 1934 2,812,105 Parker Nov. 5, 1957 2,998,179Zilles Aug. 29, 1961

